Increasing demand across virtually all aspects of modern life drives integrated circuit technology. Demands for smaller, cheaper, faster, include packaging of integrated circuits. In general, an electronic package is defined as the housing and interconnection of integrated circuits, also referred to as ‘semiconductor device’, ‘chip’ or ‘die’, to form an electronic system. The package should provide a structure physically supporting the chip and protecting the chip from the environment, a means for removing heat generated by the chips or system, and/or electrical connections to provide signal and power access to and from the chip.
Faster, more reliable, and higher-density circuits, produced at lower cost, are the goals for the entire integrated circuit (IC) packaging industry to produce smaller devices for cellphones, video cameras, portable music players, etc. The goals of packaging IC for the future will be met by reducing the number of internal interconnections and increasing the density of chips. Various techniques, such as, flip chip, gall grid array (BGA), chip on board (COB), and multi-chip modules (MCM), have been developed to meet the continued demands for improving system performance and hardware capabilities, while the space in which to provide these improved hardware capabilities continues to decrease.
In the production process of a semiconductor device, individual semiconductor chips are manufactured by forming a circuit such as IC, LSI or the like in a large number of areas arranged in a lattice pattern on the front surface of a substantially disk-like semiconductor wafer having an orientation notch in the edge.
As lighter and smaller electronic devices come into demand for smaller cellphones, computers, and other personal devices, the lattice pattern must be even smaller and the ICs must be even thinner than the thickness of the semiconductor wafer.
To produce even thinner ICs, a process for backgrinding the semiconductor wafer has been developed in which the semiconductor wafer is flipped over for the backside to be ground using a grinding wheel.
Unfortunately, as the semiconductor wafer is ground thinner, edge chipping occurs at the outside edge of the semiconductor wafer and this sometimes results in cracking of individual ICs around the outside periphery and even inside the outer periphery of the semiconductor wafer. This means that the yield is reduced as valuable ICs are damaged.
Across virtually all applications, there continues to be growing demand for increasing capacity and increasing performance of integrated circuits. The seemingly endless restrictions and requirements are no more visible than with products in our daily lives. Smaller and denser integrated circuits are expected in many portable electronic products as well as in many larger electronic systems. As the demand grows for smaller electronic products with more features, manufacturers are seeking ways to include more functions within the same or smaller product form factors.
Thus, a need still remains for an integrated circuit system to provide improved thinning as well as manufacturing yield. In view of the increasing demand for improved integrated circuits and particularly smaller products at lower costs, it is increasingly critical that answers be found to these problems.
Solutions to these problems have been long sought but prior developments have not taught or suggested any solutions and, thus, solutions to these problems have long eluded those skilled in the art.